August 17/12 10:13 am - UCI Announces Country Quotas for Road Worlds

Posted by Editor on 08/17/12

The UCi announced today the country quotas for the Road World Championships, to be held between September 16th and 24th in the Limburg region of the Netherlands. The quotas are based on country rankings in the WorldTour and Continental Tours. This year, for the first time in a while, the Junior categories rejoin the Elite men and women, and the Under 23 men for one combined Championships.

This year, for the first time, the Road Worlds will start with a Team Time Trial for trade teams. There are no Canadian registered teams qualified, however, a number of teams will likely have Canadians on them, including for the men: Orica-GreenEdge (Svein Tuft and possibly Christian Meier), Garmin-Sharp (Ryder Hesjedal), Sky (Michael Barry) and Team Europcar (David Veilleux). On the women's side, Specialized-lululemon for certainly have Clara Hughes, Exergy Twenty12 will have Rhae Shaw, Tibco could have Tara Whitten and Vienne Futuroscope with Julie Beveridge.

In the individual time trial, each country can enter the names of up to four riders, of whom two may start, for each category. There are a few additional entrants that may participate, by virtue of being the outgoing world champion, Olympic champion or Continental champion. Canada does not have any riders in these categories, unlike last year, when Clara Hughes was the Americas champion.

For the Road races, the formula is considerably more complicated, but for canada there are the following allotments:

Elite Men - Six enrolled and four starters

Elite Women - 12 enrolled and six starters

Under 23 Men - Six enrolled and three starters (note: this category will receive one final revision on September 1st, but should have little impact on Canada)